First LiveJournal Then The WHOLE USA…

I’ve received so many emails about the WSJ front page article in which the Russian expert, a professor and ex-KGB agent predicts that the US will falter and be split up into five zones (see map below, [4] here is a link to the original article and [5] here is a link to his video interview) and each zone will be controlled by another country like China, Canada, Mexico, and EU. Alaska would go to its “rightful” (more like wishful) owner – Russia. You get the gist. I could not contain myself, I had to respond with a letter to Mr. Ex-KBG.

Desperate times call for desperate measures. No kidding. I understand why you took the collapse of the Soviet Union model added some wishful thinking and applied it to the United States. [4] See Wall Street Journal article.

The Great U.S. of A is not the Soviet Union, this analogy doesn’t work on this country. The Soviet Union was a collection of loosely assembled countries that shared little in common except … well, actually with the exception of common borders I cannot think of a single thing that united them. Flag? Hymn? No, they were quick to disembark from the Soviet Union, turn the red flag into a doormat and erase the lyrics of the Soviet hymn from their memory.

Ukrainians, Belorussians, and Russians had something in common, but Georgians, Armenians, Tajikistanis, and Uzbekistanis were always looked at by Russians as secondhand citizens. Estonians disliked Russia, but don’t blame them, they did not join the Soviet Union voluntarily. The former soviet republics were happy to return to the pre-Soviet Union state.

Unlike the Soviet Union, in the U.S. we share similar values, goals and traditions that developed over more than two hundred years. Geographic state borders have little significance with the exception that in some states you are allowed to carry a concealed weapon; in some, until recently, you could not buy alcohol on Sunday. That is just plain wrong, but I still remained in Colorado and did not announce my allegiance to the California Republic as you would call it. In some states food is very spicy — and that is alright. In some gambling and prostitution are legal — and this is alright too. America is a melting pot. Sure we make fun of the New Yorkers’ fast talk or the Texan’s drawl. But tolerant we are.

Due to the ease of mobility of employment, we constantly migrate from state to state, thus our geographic loyalties don’t go further than our Alma Matter’s football team. Our geographic preference of habitation is a function of climate, employment, proximity of mother-in-law — it has to be at least two hours away, by a very fast plane if possible — and pure randomness. We have no allegiance to a specific state — we are citizens of the United States. Culture doesn’t divide us, like it did the Soviet Union, it unites us.

You discuss the return of Russian dominance. I don’t know anyone who takes it seriously, except Russia, of course. Russia’s recent dominance is a blip in time (sorry). Unlike the U.S., Russia has a very narrow economy that has mostly been driven by natural resources and was brought to life, for a short moment, by a global commodity bubble. If Russia did not have nuclear weapons and a large army, we’d spend as much time talking about it as an election in Mozambique.

Take high commodity prices away and you find … well, Russia today: limited property rights, corruption, bribery, semi-dictatorship, and government control of the press. Newspapers and television are controlled by the government, journalists are dropping like flies.

No, Russia is not the United States. The United States has its problems, but these problems are not structural and time will heal them. Despite all of our problems, the U.S. is still the best economic and most stable political system, period. We have peacefully elected our president every four years for over two centuries. I bet you if every country in the world opened its borders to unlimited migrations in and out, you’d find the U.S. population balloon and Russia’s shrink. People from all over the world want to live here.

Dear Mr. Ex-KGB, the Russian economy is crumbling. To divert attention from the internal problems (and more importantly from him) Mr. Putin is redirecting attention onto the “evil” United States. After all, we created the global economic crisis, sabotaged the oil market, and whatever else is wrong taking place in the world, we must have had a hand in it. Now it is even a common belief in Russia that the CIA was responsible for the September 11th attacks.

Anti-Americanism is on the rise in Russia. You made an America-fall-apart prediction public almost ten years ago, but it was only recently picked up by Russian (predominantly government-owned) media. You are a superstar in Russia — you get two interviews a day. Unfortunately predictions that would have been taken as lunacy by most Russians in the past are now turned into wishful thinking. And wishful thinking has disappointed the Russian public since forever.

Sincerely,

Vitaliy Katsenelson, CFA

Central North-American Republic, formerly known as Colorado

Ya know, it reminds me of all those times Checkov waxed poetic about all those great literature pieces and other “discoveries” that were all conveniently from “Mother Russia” This guy I think saw Red Dawn once too many times.If anything, we will just implode and become internal fighting factions like in “The Postman” where only Kevin Costner and a bag of mail can save us!

In other news, this whole LJ implosion thing kinda makes sense in many ways. The vibe here since Russian p0wn3d LJ has been different and of late, people have been less involved I think. I had thought that a lot of this was to do with our state of affairs in the world, but, I think people started to feel it subconsciously and began to back off the LJ.

As I write this now, I am backing up the LJ for posterity in case the Russki’s decide to axe the whole deal and sell the LJ servers to the underground carding services, where they will likely make a hell of a lot more money… Watch your CC#’s kids…

Speaking of that, a very interesting article in WIRED on cardersmarket and the whole behind the scenes hack attack and SSS/FBI infiltration to bring down Max. I am happy to report that in my sniffing about the whole scene, I did not get pinched for having a peek. I am no carder, but I was interested in a look at the naughty bits there.

It’s a good story of what really went down in the internecine world of credit card fraud as well as hints at where you could (past tense) buy a whole new “suit” to disappear in. Those whacky Ukrainians…

Meanwhile, back in LJ land, I posted recently on Stalin’s being the #3 on the top ten of Hip guys in Russia now and got a mystery post from Brazil… Their response?

It is not without reason that Putin is restoring tzarism, under his command.

Oh my…. Kinda ominous and yet not. Say, aren’t the Russians there now with their fleet on maneuvers? Oh boy… Guess my new Tsarist overlords are watching me! But seriously, I am on many RU LJ’s so meh, I am a “known element” I guess. Please guys, no Polonium enema’s for me ok? Thank ya very much tovarisch.

Well.. I shall let this here LJ back up and see what shakes out in the near future. Should the end come I am sure I will set up something new and fun in its place…

> but it was only recently picked up by Russian
>(predominantly government-owned) media

you know, the only places where i see this “prognosis from an ex-KGB agent” – are _american_ websites, not russian TV, newspapers or blogs.
according to yandex (most respected russian-oriented web-search) most popular themes in russian blogs now are christmas, annual bargain about gas prices with Ukraine (it’s an ongoing sitcom really😉 and Apple’s Macworld..

for me it looks more like someone is “redirecting attention” of americans by using favourite mascot of “evil empire” – KGB.
and by the sight of this patriotic approal – it works😉

——————————–
as for backuping your LJ – i did it the moment i read the news of SUP purchasing it and so did many other russian users of lj

the reason is quite simple – it’s a natural instinct to any russian NOT to TRUST your government\boss\anyone with money or any kind of power over you.
never to trust, never to rely upon, never expect any help, never believe anything that’s told on TV or written in newspapers – read between the lines.

Panarin’s story seemed to get real play here after being in the WSJ. I read about it from another blog that laughed at it. I frankly think that the people here generally see this as complete farce and nothing else.

So, perhaps the Russian press just never bothered with it for its crackpot nature to start with…

As to reading between the lines and trust in the government.. Since when do I trust the gov here?

Panarin’s story seemed to get real play here after being in the WSJ. I read about it from another blog that laughed at it. I frankly think that the people here generally see this as complete farce and nothing else.

So, perhaps the Russian press just never bothered with it for its crackpot nature to start with…

As to reading between the lines and trust in the government.. Since when do I trust the gov here?